The Knight of Malta Part 11

Reine accepted the baron's plans, and the baron wrote at length to his brothers, the commander and Father Elzear, without whose advice he did nothing, concerning the happy betrothal.

Their response was favourable to Honorat, and the marriage was fixed for the Christmas celebration which would follow the young girl's eighteenth birthday.

Thus pa.s.sed two years in the midst of sweet hopes and a pure, calm love.

Honorat, serious and gentle, began at once his part as mentor, and by degrees acquired a great ascendancy over the mind of Reine.

Raimond V. loved his daughter so foolishly and idolatrously, that the happy influence of Honorat saved her from her father's weakness.

The girl had lost her mother when she was in the cradle, and had been reared under the eyes of the baron by Stephanette's mother, an excellent woman, and, although happily endowed with good instincts, had been permitted to indulge her caprice at will.

Her lively imagination exaggerated sympathy and antipathy, and she often received the wise and reasonable suggestions of Honorat with mischievous irony and even resentment.

Legend and romance were the mental food she craved, and often in thought she pictured herself as the heroine of some strange adventure.

Honorat would dissipate these fantastic visions by a breath, and not infrequently reproached Reine, with as much good-humour as gaiety, for these vagabond imaginations.

But these little differences were soon forgotten. Reine would confess her wrong-doing with adorable frankness, and the beautiful affection of the two lovers seemed only to increase.

Unconsciously, Reine began to feel the influence of Honorat more and more in her daily life, and instead of indulging herself in vague reveries and foolish imaginations, occupied her mind with graver thoughts. She recognised the nothingness of her former dreams, and every step of this wise and happy way served to establish her love for Chevalier de Berrol.

Her mind and character had undergone such a complete transformation under the influence of Honorat, that her father, sometimes, when he had gone beyond the limits of temperance, would say in jest that Reine was becoming insupportably serious.

The sentiment of Reine for Honorat was by no means a pa.s.sionate love, nourished by difficulties and uncertainties, but a calm, sincere, and reasonable affection, in which the young girl recognised, with a sort of tender veneration, the superior reason of her betrothed.

Such were the sentiments of Mlle, des Anbiez when the fatal meeting in the rocks of Ollioules took place.

The first time that she saw Erebus, placed her under the influence of a profound sentiment of grat.i.tude; he had just saved the baron's life.

Reine, perhaps, might never have observed the surprising beauty of the stranger, but for the startling circ.u.mstances by which he was presented to her.

The fact that he had just delivered her father from a frightful danger was the most powerful fascination that Erebus could offer.

No doubt the charm was broken when, after the few words uttered by his companions, his countenance and manner changed, and he had the audacity to press his lips to hers. The features of the stranger, that a moment before possessed a beauty so pure, and an amiability so lovely, seemed suddenly to disappear under the mask of an insolent libertine.

Since that day, Erebus appeared to her always under these two different physiognomies.

Sometimes she tried to banish from her memory all thought of an audacious stranger, who had insolently robbed her of what she would have given to her father's saviour with reluctance. Again, she would dream, with a deep sentiment of grat.i.tude, that her father owed his life to this same stranger who at first seemed so courageous and so timid.

Unhappily for Reine's repose of mind, Erebus united and justified, so to speak, these two distinct natures, and in her thought she gave him sometimes her admiration, and sometimes her contempt.

So she wavered between these two sentiments.

Thus the natural exaggeration of her character, rather suppressed than destroyed, was excited by this singular adventure.

The unknown one seemed to her the genius of good and the genius of evil.

Involuntarily, her excitable mind tried to penetrate the secret of this double power.

Reine herself was made aware of her morbid mental condition only by the tender reproaches of Honorat, who accused her of distraction. For the first time, then, Reine realised with horror the empire that the unknown person had gained over her mind; she resolved to escape from it, but the resistance with which she endeavoured to drive Erebus from her mind, only made her think of him the more.

In her vexation she shed bitter tears, and sought refuge and diversion in the calm and wise conversation of Honorat.

Nothing could make her forget the past. Notwithstanding his goodness and kindness, her betrothed seemed to weary her, and even wound her.

She dared not open her heart to him. The baron, too, was the best of fathers, yet absolutely incapable of comprehending the unaccountable anguish of his daughter.

Concentrated by silence, and overexcited by solitude, a sentiment mingled with curiosity, admiration, and almost hatred, began to take deep root in the heart of Reine.

Many times she shuddered to see that the gravity of Honorat oppressed her. In her thought she reproached him for having nothing in his career that was adventurous or romantic.

She compared his peaceful and uniform life with the mystery which surrounded the stranger.

Then, ashamed of such thoughts, she sought to fix her hopes upon her approaching union with Honorat,--a union so sacred that, in the fulfilment of its duties, every foolish dream and imagination would be effaced.

Such was the state of Reine's heart when, by an inexplicable mystery, she found in the same day two objects, the sight of which redoubled her anguish and excited every power of her imagination.

This stranger, or one of his agents, was then near her, though invisible.

She could not suspect the servants within the walls of Maison-Forte of being in collusion with the stranger. All of them were old servants, grown gray in the service of Raimond V.

Reared, so to speak, by them, she was too well acquainted with their life and morality to believe them capable of underhand manoeuvres. The fact that the picture was placed on her praying-stool in her chamber, disquieted her above all.

She was on the point of going to her father and telling him all, but an instinctive love of the marvellous restrained her; she feared to break the charm. Her romantic character found a sort of pleasure, mingled with fear, in this mystery.

Inaccessible to superst.i.tion, of a firm and decided mind, and recognising the fact that, after all, there was nothing really dangerous in allowing this strange adventure to take its course, Reine rea.s.sured herself, after searching her chamber and the connecting one very carefully.

She took up the picture again, looked at it for some time, then, after dreaming awhile, she threw it into the fire.

She followed the destruction of this little masterpiece with a melancholy gaze.

By a strange chance the vellum, detached from the frame, caught first on both sides.

Thus the figure of Erebus burned the last and was outlined a moment on the burning embers,--then a light flame leaped upon it, and all disappeared.

Reine remained a long time gazing in the fireplace, as though she still saw there the picture which had been consumed.

The clock of Maison-Forte struck two in the morning; the young girl returned to her senses, went to bed, and, for a long time, tried to fall asleep.

CHAPTER X. THE RECORDER

The day after the occurrence of the events we have just related, a group of several persons, some on foot, and others on horseback, skirted the edge of the sea, and seemed to direct their course toward the Gulf of La Ciotat.

The most important personage of this little caravan was a man of considerable corpulence, with a solemn and formal countenance, wearing a travelling-cloak over his habit of black velvet.

He had a chain of silver around his neck, and rode a little horse with an ambling gait.